I haven’t posted any of my writings in nearly a year because I haven’t felt like I had time to revise and edit and do them justice. But today’s funny little post is funny…and little…and time sensitive to today’s date, so I figured I might as well get it up here either way.
By now, you probably know that crazy dreams are a nightly adventure for me. Well, amidst last night’s nightmares, there was one quirky plot that actually turned out to be surprisingly thought provoking.
It started out with an unlikely family trip—me, my sisters Megan and Kasey (who lives in DC), and my parents (who really don’t “take trips” anymore)—somewhere in a far off campsite or recreational area of Washington.
Four of us had been ready to leave for a few hours but Megan had supposedly been hanging out by herself for a while and wasn’t answering her phone. We were getting sunburned and cranky while waiting for her to come back so I went to track her down. Turns out, among other things, she had been out on a multi-mile run with a bunch of unknown people. I accompanied her back to the locker rooms to make sure she finished quickly. But then a bunch of guys came in to the girls locker room, and just went right on in to the showers. None of the girls seemed to mind. And as one particularly tall, dark, and handsome guy dried off, he introduced himself to me as Megan’s boyfriend and said it was their “1 year anniversary of when they hooked up.” The fact that I almost had eyes popping out of my face was less because it was a dream and more because I have an over expressive face. I really tried to play it cool, but WHAT?!
On the long walk back to our family, I tried not to be so ticked about our 3 hour wait because there was obviously a bigger priority to take care of. And my semi-cranky patience paid off: Megan said she didn’t want to tell anyone because she thinks he’s Muslim and no one would approve. (I wondered how they could be together a year and not actually know something important like that, but I figured that would come across as snotty and I skipped that question.) So I asked if instead of lying about NOT seeing each other, could they just lie about him NOT being Muslim. That way, at least they could still be together. (Maybe not the best big sister advice I’ve ever given… But hey, it was a dream after all!)
Then suddenly we noticed it was almost dark outside and there was a ridiculously amazing full moon showing over the mountains so I stopped to get some pictures of it. The moon was rising and sinking and rising practically every 2 minutes, and it had vibrant blues and purples and pinks around it, like some sort of nocturnal sunset. Megan just sat on the grass and watched it, completely at peace. Eventually, I gave up on trying to capture it.
As we rounded the last leg of the walk back to the family, I asked her what his name was because I hadn’t been able to understand it in the noisy locker room. She said it was Tajim.
When I woke up I wondered if that was actually a real name, even if it wasn’t a Muslim name. So I looked it up. And the name that I’d dreamt about was in fact a real name for Muslim men...And the name means Respect…Then I realized today was also 9/11…Wow. How?! And why?? I won’t claim to know the extent of this dream’s significance here...but at the very least, I feel like today we could all use a little more respect and boundary-breaking love. And a magical moonset could be a nice addition too.
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